MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS 



FARMERS MORE CAREFUL. 



The absence of forest tires in the copper 

 country thi.- ,-ummer has given rise to c> 

 crable speculation and comment. L: 

 this time the entire copper country, in com- 

 mon with the state at large, v ;t fire 

 swept, and hundreds of thon-and- of di.llars 

 worth of damage resulted. So far this sum- 

 mer there has not been a single big 

 led. 



There are many who 



ers and farmers have profited by their terrible 

 experience :" last -r.mmer. and that extreme 

 care and caution was used this summer in 

 clearing away underbrush and stunipage. Or- 

 dinarily lire- were started ::t fre'|Uei:t intcr- 

 .vith the result the flar id quickly 



until they were be;. 



The pall of smoke which overhung tht 

 tire cr-pper country fcr many week- 

 gu-t is well remembered and resident - 

 congratulating tht ;i their 



fortune thi- year. Careful inquiry ha- failed 

 to elicit any i 

 tire in the district and the farm triers 



hoping the record will be :: 

 throughout the remainder of the y 



La-t ,-ummer millions of feet 

 timber were il '>y the flame- 



very bin ' sses were reported. In many in- 

 stances human life was in <: mers and 

 homesteader- being driven from *he : r home- 

 by the rushing flames. All effort.- to tight the 

 flames were futile and it was not until heavy 

 rains set in that the danger was eliminated. 



LOSS THROUGH FOREST FIRES. 



With timber growing more scarce and more 

 valuable there should be a special effort made 

 to prevent a repetition of la-t \ rd in 



lirei. An effective policy may entail the 

 maintenance of a larger force by the provinces 

 and also by the Dominion where valuable tim- 

 ber is under federal authority. According to 

 a report by the forestry branch of the interior 

 department, there were - 

 ous proportions in the dominion during 

 British Columbia was the chief suffert . 

 total Ir.-s through the 235 fires in that province 

 being ?-'">. ooo. 000. This was the value of the 

 4o. ooo. duo fee: :' timber and of the mills, im- 

 provements, and other property de-u 

 The loss in that province at no per 



cent of the entire loss in the Dominion. This 

 unusually large aggregate was due 

 sive fire- in the Cr untry and 



i.n Vancouver Island. 



Quebec suffered from 2oO fires, but the 

 gate dar. j 5 small compared with 



that in the Pacific Province. The total area 

 burned over in the Dominion w 

 acre-. The record is more deeply imp- 

 by the los- of twenty-one lives. With the 

 advance of settlement and the growth 

 more adventurous spirit among campers, hunt- 

 :id explorers the danger of forest fires 

 continually increase-. Wood-ranging < 

 sufficient a few years ago are inadequate to 

 the heavier duties devolving on them. To 

 insure against any of the seemingly inevitable 

 fires getting beyond control it is nee- 

 that men be in readiness for the concentration 

 of efforts wherever a danger may di 

 This is one of many phases of the forest 

 prc.-ervation problem, and the records show 

 that it has not received the measure of atten- 

 tion its importance demands. 



TIMBER GROWTH AND WASTE. 



The fore-try service of the United Si 

 has just given out some statistics that are of 

 unusual interest to Michigan, for they confirm 

 the general statements hitherto widely circu- 

 lated that our timber resources are being rap- 



Fire Cherry in Mixed Hardwood Regeneration Attacked by Its Worst 



Enemy, "Black Knot." 



idly diminished and at the present rate will 



soon be exhausted. The yearly growth of the 



are told, is less than 84,000,000,000 



feet, board measure, while we are actually 



cutting for use, apart from the large losses 



rms and insects, about 240.000.- 



'0 feet, or nearly three times as much. 



The largest .reservoir in the world must in 



'e emptied if it gives out three times as 



much as it receive-. 



There is rea- dieving that this enor- 



expenditure of our timber resource- i- 

 largely due to wasteful practices, comments 

 the Xew York Tribune. We "use" each year 

 no less than 3,000 feet board measure, for 

 every man, woman and child in the country, 

 while Germany uses only 444 feet and France 

 only 300 feet. Xow it may be that we legiti- 

 mately need and ought to use more tkan those 

 but we must doubt if the difference 

 ought to be as great as it is. It can scarcely 

 be defensible for us to make way with ten 

 much lumber as France and nearly 

 :i times as much as Germany. 

 We might use a good deal more than Ger- 

 many and yet not deplete our forests if only 

 proper methods of cutting and of forest cul- 

 ture were observed. The state forests of Ger- 

 many, which are a source of profit to that 

 empire, produce yearly an average new gr 



. board feet to the acre, while in the 

 United States such growth i- not more than 

 144 feet, or only one-fourth as much. Yet cur 

 soil is richer than that of Germany and we 

 have ju.-t as fast growing trees. The differ- 

 ence in her favor ai :n the fact that her 

 cultivated far more intelligently 

 and scientifically than ours. Here a fcre-t is 

 commonly regarded as a piece of woodland 

 which is to be cut off and <U - -.vhiie 

 there it is a permanent plantation of trees 

 which is to be cultivated and maintained in 



constant productiveness. It ought not to take 

 this country many more years to learn ti.at 

 better way. 



GERMANY, FORESTRY MODEL. 



Forest experts of all nationalities agree that 

 Germany is in an enviable position as regards 

 her lumber supply. Xo nation in the world 

 makes more thorough utilization of its forest 

 resources. 



The German empire has approximately 

 35,00,000 acres of forest, of which 31.9 per cent 

 belongs to the state. Many years ago that 

 country awakened to the necessity of applying 

 the same methods of business economy to the 

 management of its forest lands that are applied 

 to its operations in trade, and the result is 

 that Germany's practice of forestry has served 

 as a model for all other countries. 



German forestry is remarkable in three ways 

 it has always led in scientific thoroughness 

 and now it is working out results with an ex- 

 actness almost equal to that of the laboratory; 

 it has applied this scientific kowledge with the 

 greatest technical success; and it has solved 

 the problem of securing through a long series 

 of years an increasing forest output and in- 

 creasing profits at the same time. 



Starting with forests which were in as bad 

 shape as many of our own cut-over areas, 

 Germany raised the average yield of wood per 

 acre from twenty cubic feet in 1830 to seventy- 

 five cubic feet in 1908. During the same period 

 it trebled the proportion of saw timber secured 

 from the average cut, which means, in other 

 words, that through the practice of forestry 

 the timber lands of Germany are of three times 

 better quality today than when no system was 

 used. In a little over half a century it in- 

 creased the money returns from an average 

 acre of forest sevenfold, and today the forests 

 are in better condition than ever before. 



